aka The Trials and Tribulations of the Dangville Ocho Stinkos, Week 2

This week in the Power Creative Fantasy Football League, the Dangville Ocho Stinkos clashed with the “Cup Busters” (managed by one of those creative types in the other building).  Going into the matchup, I was a reasonable favorite to win… details after the jump.

Previous weeks: 1

Hurricane Ike made his presence known throughout the Eastern US this week, boy-howdy! Cancelling games in Houston, like the Baltimore Ravens/Houston Texans game on Sunday and in baseball, forcing the Astros and the Cubs to relocate to Milwaukee (where Carlos Zambrano pitched a no-hitter!)  The Houston/Baltimore game is being rescheduled for November 9th, so I dumped the Texans kicker (Kris Brown) and picked up John Kasay who kicks for Carolina. The kicker round-robin begins already!

My lineup this week:

QB – Ben Roethlisberger, Steelers
RB – Joseph Addai, Colts
RB – Michael Turner, Falcons
RB – Matt Forte, Bears
WR – Greg Jennings, Packers
WR – Terrell Owens, Cowboys
TE – Vernon Davis, 49ers
K – John Kasay, Carolina Panthers

Meanwhile, on the bench say Aaron Rodgers, upstart QB for the Packer who replaced Brett Favre. Rodgers did pretty well in his first game out.  I chose to start Roethlisberger because he was up against the Cleveland Browns whom he dominated last year in Week 1 with four (4) TD passes.

That was a mistake.

Not so much that Roethlisberger sucked (which he didn’t), but that Rodgers was so much better. Big Ben got me 12.3 points, with 186 passing yards and a single passing TD. Rodgers, on the other hand, blew up with a Tom-Brady-esque 328 passing yards, 3 passing TDs and even 25 rushing yards.

Roethlisberger: 12.3 points
Rodgers: 26.9 points

So, Rodgers might be for real.  But two games is an awful small sample size on which to go formulating predictions. I’ll consider the matchup this next week, but it’s looking like Big Ben has some competition. Either that, or I’ll trade off Rodgers to one of the Packer nuts here in the office.

But, back to the game at hand. Addai was my first pick of the draft, and so far he’s been a colossal wash, netting 15 points for me total in the first two weeks. Word on the grapevine says that the Colts are looking to “get back to basics” which is taken to mean that Addai will hopefully become more of an option for Peyton Manning. He better have a 15+ point game in either Week 3 or 4 or I’m dumping him to one of his fans in the office.

My “star” running back from Week 1, Atlanta’s Michael Turner, fell back to earth netting me only 5 points after a dazzling 35 point week with 220 rushing yards and two TD’s. At least I know he is capable of great things. Addai, however, has yet to produce… at all. A total of 64 yards in two games. There are a couple dozen RB’s in the league who have more than Addai. C’mon folks!

My two WRs, T.O. and Jennings (who has become fave target of Rodgers, it seems) combined for 40+ points.

As our power was out (see the details here: Windstorm ’08) on Monday night, I went to sleep with the Cowboys game at halftime, and T.O. already having scored 22.4 points, leaving with a .5 point lead over the Cup Busters. We both had two players left – I had T.O. and the Cup Busters had the Patrick Crayton, who also plays for the Cowboys.  Certainly T.O. would catch a few more passes in the 2nd half, right?!

Wrong. T.O. didn’t touch the the ball in the 2nd half. Patrick Crayton, however, did. Connecting with Romo in the fourth quarter for a 16 yard pass, netting the Cup Busters 1.6 points and the win in week 2. I really can’t blame T.O., though – he did make up a big gap for me, as I was some 20+ points down on Sunday. Let’s talk about who really came up empty:

TE - Vernon Davis, Zero (0) Points

Vernon Davis was thrown four (4) passes from 49er’s QB J. T. O’Sullivan who threw for a combined 321 yards on the day.  Just ONE catch from Davis would have likely put me over the top this week, but instead I got a goose-egg. Guess who got dropped for Seattle’s TE John Carlson?  That’d be you, Vernon Davis. Clean out your fantasy locker.  The tight end round-robin begins.

FINAL SCORE: Dangville 108.8 – Cup Busters 110.65

Well, I’m 1-and-1 this season and feeling pretty good about my team.

Problem Areas
Joseph Addai – Concussed twice early this season. Not getting the yards or the attempts.
Marques Colston – Out 3-5 more weeks with a torn thumb ligament.

Highlights
Aaron Rodgers – Favre who?
Greg Jennings – Rodgers new fave
T.O. – Let’s get a good T.O. quote in here: “The Lord has obviously blessed me with a lot of talent”. Yeah, there we go.

NEXT WEEK: Dangville vs. The Widow Makers. The Widow Makers are managed by none other than Power Fantasy Football Commish and all-round great dude, Charlie Dillon. I look forward to making him weep.